How to Create a WordPress Plugin (Beginner’s Guide) - Kussin | Development Unit Macedonia

How to Create a WordPress Plugin (Beginner’s Guide)


Creating Your First WordPress Plugin

10.02.2023 | Ilir Raufi | Blog, Development

The fact that WordPress is open-source is one of the key factors contributing to its popularity. Over 50,000 plugins have been created so far. You might be curious in how to make your own WordPress plugin, though. Fortunately WordPress makes the process easy, and learning how to build a simple plugin for your website isn’t particularly challenging. Among other things, this will make it possible for you to provide more functionality to your website.

We’ll examine WordPress plugins in more detail in this article, along with the potential benefits of creating one. Next, we’ll walk you through creating your first plugin. Let’s get going!

 

An Introduction to WordPress Plugins.

WordPress plugins are like apps for your WordPress website.You can install plugins in WordPress to add new functionality, much like you can with apps on your phone.

You may add social media share buttons, newsletter signup forms, popups, transform WordPress into a full-fledged e-commerce site, and more with the help of plugins, for example:

Thousands of free plugins are currently available on WordPress.org, and thousands more may be found from third-party websites like Github.

 

How Do WordPress Plugins Work?

The way WordPress is constructed makes it possible for other programmers to contribute their own code to it. A wide range of hooks and filters are available in the WordPress plugin API, enabling developers to change or add to the functionality already present in WordPress.

The beauty of WordPress is that you don’t have to share solutions you create for your own website on the plugin market. However, many developers choose to make their plugins available to other users to assist them in resolving similar problems.

Every WordPress plugin that you have installed on your website is listed in the WordPress database. You can activate and deactivate them at any time you want.

 

Creating Your First WordPress Plugin.

There are thousands of plugin therefore, the first thing you need do is conduct some research to determine whether your idea has already been thought of. Investigate comparable plugins and consider how you might be able to improve on them. As an alternative, you might expand to what is already offered by adding features.

The next step is to set up a testing environment. As a beginner, you will probably pick up a lot of knowledge along the way, therefore you shouldn’t try out new things on a live site. You can test your plugin in private while working on it using a local environment without breaking your site or interrupting your visitors.

You can use Docker to create a WordPress local environment.

Create a new folder on your desktop and give it a name, such as “my-first-plugin,” before beginning.

Next, you’ll need to create a PHP file to add to this folder. To do this, open your preferred text editor and enter the following information:

/**
* Plugin Name: Kussin Plugin
* Author: Kussin | Ecommerce und Online Marketing
* Author URI: https://www.kussin.de
*/


Of course, you’ll need to change the above information to match your details. When you’re ready, you can save your file. Remember to use the file extension php.Once you’ve completed this, go to the Plugins page in the WordPress dashboard of your test site. Your new plugin should be visible at this point.If you activate this plugin, it won’t accomplish anything just yet.

After adding the plugin header, you can start adding the plugin code below it.

Each plugin is unique. But they all share common components. For instance, all plugins communicate with WordPress using hooks.A hook is how a plugin connects to the pre-existing code of WordPress core’s programming.

Feel free to experiment with the code and try using a different function. Please be aware that you can also include this code in the functions.php file for your theme. This file contains code that adds functionality to your site, and works in a way that is very similarl to how a plugin does. You will, however, lose these changes if you choose to use a different theme in the future or if your current theme is upgraded to a new version.

Try your plugin on a live site after you’re satisfied with it. Once more, be sure to properly test your plugin for flaws and vulnerabilities.

 

Further resources to learn more about WordPress plugins.

WordPress plugins can be as straightforward as the one we just demonstrated. They may also be significantly more powerful, similar to an eCommerce plugin.

Here are some resources that will help you learn more ways to add functionality into your WordPress plugins:

  1. Plugin Handbook
  2. Plugin Resources

  3. Here is an in-depth tutorial on how to publish a plugin to the WordPress repository

 

[contact-form-7 404 "Not Found"]